Monika Wirges – Wuppertal Institut für Klima, Umwelt und Energie and Zhang Lingling – BlueSky4Children
The objective of the Twinning was to discuss the possibility of building a sustainable clothing network and improve the sustainability of clothing across its life cycle, focusing on recycling and different options of reuse in order to find further approaches on how to reduce the carbon, water and material footprints of clothes. Both partners benefited from the cooperation, as an insight to the different approaches towards sustainability in the other country was given.
In addition, the connection between Wuppertal Institute research methods and BlueS ky4Children’s concrete actions in the clothing sector formed a synergy with regard to the question how awareness for the recycling and reuse of clothing can be raised and why the overall environmental impact of clothing should be reduced.
“The underlying idea was to give BlueSky4Children assistance to attract interest of potential investors and other interested stakeholders..”
Monika Wirges and Susanne Fischer
” The exchange month gave us a good overview of the working method and environment of different NGOs, textile recycling company and the government/academic involvement..”
Zhang Lingling and Zhao Chunyan
Twinning Report BlueSky4Children (Shanghai) & Wuppertal Institut für Klima, Umwelt und Energie (Germany)
Twinning Experience Presentation BlueSky4Children (Shanghai) & Wuppertal Institut für Klima, Umwelt und Energie (Germany)
Founded in 2015 BlueSky4Children is a growing grassroots NGO based in Shanghai. Their main focus is on prolonging clothes lifecycles. They work on clothes recycling starting with door to door collections, continuing with recycling bin management, re-make workshops, etc. The organisation built a platform called “Two Pinecones” which is the first and only non-profitable door-to-door clothes collection platform in China. BlueSky4Children also cooperates with companies and communities to place recycling bins and provide tailored recycling courses in economically underdeveloped areas.
The Wuppertal Institut für Klima, Umwelt und Energie designs transitions towards sustainable development. It aims at generating practical and actor-oriented solutions for environmental issues on local as well as global level and is organized in four research groups: Future Energy and Mobility Structures; Energy, Transport and Climate Policy; Material Flows and Resource Management; Sustainable Production and Consumption. Clients of the Wuppertal Institute come from governments, the business and industry sector as well as civil society.